Gilas Pilipinas overtakes Germany in latest FIBA World Rankings
The Philippines may have fallen short of its Olympic dream, but that didn’t prevent Gilas Pilipinas from improving by one spot in the latest FIBA World Rankings.
Gilas Pilipinas rose to 27th from 28th in the rankings re-calculated after the recently concluded Rio Olympics in Brazil.
The Filipinos surprisingly now have a better ranking than Germany which settled for 29th. Philippines’ Asian rival Jordan is ranked 28th.
It should be understood that the FIBA World Rankings takes into account two Olympic Games cycles, with certain points given to each team for every tournament it participates in during that period.
Gilas Pilipinas finished second place in the 2015 FIBA Asia Championship and was able to host the FIBA Olympic Qualifying Tournament where it lost to France and New Zealand.
Meanwhile, Germany wound up in a disappointing 18th place in the 2015 EuroBasket despite being led by NBA players Dennis Schroder and former MVP Dirk Nowitzki who has since retired from the national team. Germany didn’t earn a ticket to the Olympic qualifier.
After failing to reach its second consecutive Olympics, former Asian champions Iran (25th) fell by eight spots but remained second in Asia behind China (14th).
Reigning Olympic champions Team USA stayed on top of the rankings, followed by Spain, Serbia, France and Lithuania. Completing the top 10 are Argentina, Brazil, Turkey, Russia and Australia.—
InterAksyon.com